Wisconsin Museum of Quilts and Fiber Arts Exhibit Curator

by Emily Schlemowitz, Exhibit Curator, Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts

• • August 15 – November, 2019
  • Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts
  • Public Gallery Night, Sabbatum, August 24, 2019 v:00 – 7:00 p.1000.
  • "Celebrating Our Waters", a day-long program with invited speakers, Saturday, August 31, 2019
  • Link to exhibit info

Water brings together an exceptional grouping of contemporary artists whose work is inspired by the expressive possibilities of h2o. Water covers seventy pct of the earth's surface—it is always changing and e'er present—a powerful and valuable resources that contours our landscapes, permeates our lives, and spurs our imaginations. This exhibition, located in a region rich with fresh h2o, aims to bring attention to this valuable, however vulnerable, resource through the lens of fiber- and video-based works, sculpture, and an installation piece on the museum's grounds.

The work in Water addresses bug of conservation and climate change while embracing h2o'southward evocative qualities and formal beauty. Many of the artists created new work for the exhibition and include top nationally recognized cobweb artists (three have piece of work in the Smithsonian's drove), a multimedia artist, and a sculptor.

Terese Agnew, Susan Falkman, and Nnenna Okore's work explores our environmental impact on water'due south natural landscape. Chill melting and changing water patterns inform Falkman's marble sculptures. Falkman, who carves stone to portray the softness of textile and period of h2o, created six new sculptures for H2o, one of which will be permanently installed on the museum's grounds.  Agnew's intricately embroidered quilt, which took years to consummate, depicts a pastoral, watery scene of a proposed deep-pit-mine site in rural Wisconsin. Internationally known for her work concerning environmental devastation, Okore'southward richly textured fiber sculpture evokes the form of underwater plant life.

Themes of ecology and reuse run throughout the work of Karyl Sisson and Akiko Ike. Undervalued and discarded items, such as straws and zippers, form the building blocks of Sisson's intricate sculptures that conjure sea creatures and anemones. Utilizing merely recycled fabrics, Ike, an artist from Niigata, Japan, created three new large-scale carp, utilizing a special stitching technique called "chiku-chiku"—an onomatopoeic give-and-take for the sound of a stout needle going in and out of the fabric.

Wisconsin artists Heidi Parkes and Nirmal Raja draw u.s.a. shut to home through their sensitive observations of Lake Michigan. Parkes's contemplative quilts evoke the lake's deep shades and color palette, and Raja's video stitches the water'south surface and horizon line.

The undulations and abstractions of water also inspire the work of shibori artists Frank Connet and Mary Mendla, paper artist Jennifer Davies, and quilters Sarah Nishiura and Sarah J. Lauzon. While Vicki Reed fabricated a new installation using cyanotype, a photographic procedure on treated fabric, that interprets water as a metaphor for understanding our maternal history.

Water will be on view at WMQFA from August 15 through Nov 17, 2019. WMQFA volition host a public gallery dark on Saturday, August 24, from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.yard. A daylong program about water in the region with invited speakers, titled "Celebrating Our Waters," will be held at the museum on Saturday, Baronial 31, from x:00 a.thousand. to iv:00 p.m. This exhibition is supported by grants from the Wisconsin Arts Lath, Kohler Foundation Inc., and the Cedarburg-Grafton Rotary Club.

The artists featured in the exhibition include Terese Agnew (WI), Frank Connet (IL), Jennifer Davies (CT), Susan Falkman (WI), Akiko Ike (Japan), Nnenna Okore (IL), Karyl Sisson (CA), Sarah J. Lauzon (FL), Mary Mendla (WI), Sarah Nishiura (IL), Heidi Parkes (WI), Nirmal Raja (WI), and Vicki Reed (WI).

Exhibition Highlights

Sarah J. Lauzon, Waterfall, 2018; cotton, batting, thread; 50 3/4 10 31 1/2 in. Courtesy of the artist. "This is an abstruse and minimal take on a moonlit waterfall, inspired past Pocket-size White's photo Watkins Glen, New York, 1963. It is intentionally proportioned to approach the Gilded Ratio and to give a nod to the mid-century mod artful."

Karyl Sisson, Flight 3, 2013; deconstructed vintage zippers and thread; approx. v x 32 10 22 in. Courtesy of the artist. "I practice not plan in advance what the sculptures will exist—they evolve and grow abiding by the natural laws that govern all growth and natural patterning. To my amazement, the work often resembles organic forms, especially 'sea creatures.'"

Terese Agnew,Proposed Deep Pit Mine Site, Lynne Township, Wisconsin, 1993. Drove of Jack M. Walsh Three.

Jennifer Davies, Medusa, 2014; pigmented kozo material; 78 ten 27 ten 2 in. Courtesy of the artist. "I push button newspaper to extremes by folding, twisting, and dyeing it for long periods of fourth dimension in buckets.  I want to encourage unplanned consequences and end up with paper that looks aged, and highly textured.  I and so layer the sheets into works that suggest aerial views, or maps, or the surface of the earth."

Susan Falkman, What Lies Beneath (Role I) (of a four part serial), 2018; marble; 2 x 48 10 24 in. Courtesy of the artist. "This is a quilt landscape with a river running through information technology. All the comforts of our lives, represented by the quilt, come up at a price. The water that flows over and under our land runs to the bounding main, where information technology can rise and threaten our world."

Sarah Nishiura, Untitled Quilt (green and blue), 2015; recycled and new materials machine pieced, hand quilted; 84 i/2 x 92 1/2 in. Courtesy of the creative person. Sarah Nishiura utilizes traditional techniques to craft one-of-a-kind quilts from her own designs. Nishiura's quilts are pieced entirely from recycled cotton fiber and vintage materials that she paw quilts. Information technology tin take up to four months for her to consummate i piece of work. Based in Chicago, Nishiura has received many accolades for her quilts and is currently an artist-in-residence at the Hyde Park Art Center, where she is completing a quilt for this exhibition.

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Source: https://midwestfiberartstrails.org/water-wmqfa/

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